From Library Journal
Both these books are the latest offerings in series that focus on individual masterpieces. Titian's "Venus of Urbino," thought by many to be the apotheosis of High Renaissance painting, is also a founding landmark of one of Western art's major topics: the female nude. Goffen (art history, Rutgers) has collected six scholarly essays by accomplished art historians that consider the Uffizi Gallery's famous work from numerous methodological points of view. Each writer addresses the painting's principal mystery: Does this eroticized, self-caressing nude actually represent Venus or is she just a 16th-century Venetian courtesan? The resulting package is a mixed bag that will no doubt at times strike many readers as pedantic and unnecessarily recondite. Written by theorists and intended for other cognoscenti and the inhabitants of their classrooms, this title should by virtue of its subject alone be purchased by larger academic libraries. Johnson (art, Univ. of Iowa) has written a far more complete, cohesive study of a single work, albeit one of much less consequence and appeal than Titian's masterpiece. In a direct and unpretentious style refreshingly free of academic cant, Johnson thoroughly delineates the literary and aesthetic antecedents of David's neoclassic depiction of two adolescent lovers' final parting?an image derived from latter-day refigurings of Homer's Odyssey. Her analysis of the painting's imagery will be accessible to a broad spectrum of readers, and her lucid explanation of its political and biographical contexts makes what at first glance seems a pale allegorical potboiler become instead a sensitive and meaningful work of art. For academic libraries.?Douglas F. Smith, Oakland P.L., Cal.Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Book Description
Arguably the quintessential work of the High Renaissance in Venice, Titian's Venus of Urbino also represents one of the major themes of western art: the female nude. But how did Titian intend this work to be received? Is she Venus, as the popular title - a modern invention - implies; or is she merely a courtesan? This book tackles this and other questions in six essays by European and American art historians. Examining the work within the context of Renaissance art theory, as well as the psychology and society of sixteenth-century Italy, and even in relation to Manet's nineteenth-century 'translation' of the work, their observations begin and end with the painting itself, and with appreciation of Titian's great achievement in creating this archetypal image of feminine beauty.

FROM THE PUBLISHER

A quintessential work of the High Renaissance in Venice, Titian's Venus of Urbino also represents one of the major themes of Western art: the female nude. But how did Titian intend this work to be received? Is she Venus, as the popular title - a modern invention - implies, or is she merely a courtesan? This book tackles this and other questions in six essays by European and American art historians. Examining the work within the context of Renaissance art theory, as well as the psychology and society of sixteenth-century Italy, and even in relation to Manet's nineteenth-century "translation" of the work, their observations begin and end with the painting itself and with appreciation of Titian's great achievement in creating this archetypal image of feminine beauty.

FROM THE CRITICS

Library Journal